March marked the end of Sekolahku Asik, Indonesian for “My School is Really Cool.” The project was a joint initiative between ChildFund Indonesia, Krakatau Posco, an Indonesian company, and the Community Chest of Korea to support Indonesia’s government in improving the quality of basic education.

“The Sekolahku Asik program has improved the schools’ infrastructures, teaching skills of the teachers, students’ engagement and employees’ participation in education,” says Min Kyung Zoon, president of Krakatau Posco.

The program was implemented in three elementary schools as a pilot in Cilegon, Banten, and 35 teachers from 13 schools in the region received training in interactive learning. Children attended consultation events to express what they wanted their schools to be like, voicing their views through drawing, writing and storytelling.

The schools received minor repairs, and employees of Krakatau Posco had the opportunity to volunteer at the schools, teaching children how to plant trees, wash their hands properly and how to dispose of organic and inorganic waste. More than 500 children benefited from the experience.

The schools now have better and cleaner restrooms, organized libraries with more books and fresh coats of paint on the walls.

A new library at Tegal Kidongdong Elementary School.

“My school was quite dull,” says 12-year-old Novalina. “The restroom was dark and dirty. Sometimes I felt scared when I went there. I joined the competition with other students to tell what we want to be improved in our school. Now, my school looks really nice and much cleaner. We chose the color for the walls, too.”

Teachers, too, were pleased with the program: “We really like the training, as it has enhanced our knowledge and skill in an interactive teaching method,” says Tati Fatayati. “This brings changes to the students; where they might have been feeling bored with the teaching process in the class, now they feel it is more fun and interactive.”

Now that the pilot stage has ended, ChildFund and Krakatau Posco are working together to continue the program at the three schools, as well as other schools, this year.

At Avadi Municipal Middle School in Thirvalluru, India, the story of the animal kingdom is literally painted on the walls. Each day, students entering the school are greeted by a massive mural, a colorful landscape with wild animals in their environment.

On another wall of the fourth-grade classroom are posters demonstrating fruits and vegetables and their importance in our daily diet.

Students have access to computers at school now.

“These are things our students get to see every day,” teacher P. Jayanthi says. “They not only see those paintings and posters but learn a lot from them. Now, it is easy for us to teach our students through these materials.”

The paintings and other learning materials were made available to the school by ChildFund India under its Enhanced Education Quality Improvement Program (EQuIP). Supported by the Caterpillar Foundation, this program is being implemented in about 100 primary and middle schools around Chennai, the capital city of the southernmost Indian state of Tamil Nadu.

The three-year project, which started in September 2011, seeks to make comprehensive quality improvements in 100 schools in Villivakkam and Ambattur areas of Thiruvallur and Chennai districts of Tamil Nadu. These schools are run by the government and most students are from impoverished homes. Many are from the first generation of their families to attend school, so they may lack full support at home. So far, the project has reached more than 4,800 students.

“These wall paintings and hangings have made our task fairly easy. They not only help the classroom look great, but also help us in a great way to engage children in learning activities continuously,” says Mercy, a teaching assistant.

“All the classrooms of our school have some kind of thematic wall paintings, and we have observed that the paintings have helped gain students’ focus and increase learning,” she adds. “This has helped us greatly in teaching slower learners or those who take a longer time to grasp any subject material. We are thankful to ChildFund India for this support.”

The School Management Committee.

Under EQuIP, schools were provided with learning modules specially designed for delayed learners, as well as workbooks, whiteboards, pencils, art materials, science sets, ceiling fans, round classroom tables and computers, among other resources. ChildFund has also appointed teachers trained to work with delayed learners.

The project has the following key objectives:

Improve the physical environment to make it more conducive for learning.

Promote an interactive and participatory learning environment.

Increase community involvement in and support for high-quality education initiatives.

Increase awareness regarding education initiatives and their importance among stakeholders.

“Many slower learners suffer from low self-esteem and lack confidence,” says teacher N. Nalini. “You can address this not only by praising small achievements but also by personalizing lessons.

“I always keep this in mind and encourage them to work on their learning abilities. I encourage children to use our learning materials to observe, predict and solve problems. I invite them to tell stories and revise lessons on a regular basis. They like the attention given to them.” When the project started last year in this school, about two dozen children were designated as delayed learners. Now, 20 of these students have improved dramatically and are at par with their peers, she adds.

Eight-year-old Pallikondal had a problem in identifying animals a year ago. But today, she says, “I know everything about these animals in this painting,” pointing to the elephants.

School Management Committee member M. Laxmi is pleased about the progress her three grandchildren have made at school. “They are all doing well in their studies. I am very happy.”

Fifth-grader Yufen (center) attends a community meeting in his Indonesian village.

By Sagita Adeswyi, ChildFund Indonesia

Yufen, a fifth-grader, lives in the Belu district of East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia. He loves to play soccer, and he also likes school.

“I have two younger sisters, but they live with my parents in another village,” he says. “On weekends, Grandma takes me to visit my parents. I love my grandma. When she takes me to the farm, she likes telling me lots of different kinds of stories. At home, I help her, collecting water for cooking from our neighbor’s well. I have lived with my grandma since I was little, because my parents said the school here is better.”

Yufen attends Nanakelot Elementary School, which is supported by ChildFund and its local partner, LPAA Belu, through the Child-Friendly School program. ChildFund has provided schools with classroom renovations, school books, teaching aids, tables, chairs, bookcases and guitars. The program, which benefits 338 children and 17 teachers, helps schools become safe, healthy and protected environments for children, encouraging child participation in all aspects of school life.

“I like to go to school because I have many friends there,” Yufen says. “What I like most is science, learning about nature and living creatures. The teachers really care about us. If we are too noisy, they will remind us to be quiet and get back to studying.”

Maria Tai, Yufen’s principal, works on lesson plans.

Maria Tai, the school’s principal, agrees that the changes have been beneficial for everyone. Teachers have learned better ways to convey information to their students by preparing lesson plans, managing their classrooms and disciplining children in more effective manners. In turn, students are more comfortable asking questions and giving their opinions in class.

“Before the training on child-friendly schools, we easily became angry with children when they made mistakes. Slowly, we changed our interactions with the children. We listen to children’s needs. On the second break between classes, children were usually asked to just stay in the class. However, some children mentioned that it was really boring and asked if they could take a break in the library. I thought it was a good idea, so I let them.” As a result, students read more than just their textbooks and discuss what they have learned back in class.

Children also are allowed to water plants in the school garden, a task formerly done by staff members. “We never thought that it could be of interest to them and that they could participate,” Tai says. “Now, children water the plants every day, using the water jugs they bring from home.”

Yufen notes that there are other new projects that have brought fresh life to school. “We also made our own attendance boards,” he says. “We made them from recycled materials like used plywood, paper and plastic. We made it together in class. When we come in to the classroom, we mark our arrival time ourselves on the attendance board.

“In every class we also have an honesty box. It is made from a used carton. It teaches us to practice honesty. If we find a pen, we put it in the box. If tomorrow morning, someone is looking for a pen, he or she will be asked to look for it in the box. Once, I lost my book. The next day I checked in the box and I found it had been put there by my friend.”

Yufen also likes to play soccer with his friends after school, but his village doesn’t have a soccer field, so they play in the garden. He hopes his school will get a field one day.

In 2012, ChildFund launched a program called Shine a Light in four countries — Dominica, Indonesia, Liberia and Senegal — thanks in large part to a major gift from a concerned donor. The project’s goal is to raise awareness of gender-based violence, assist child survivors of sexual abuse and help communities develop child-protective systems and responses. In four blog posts, we’ll learn about the progress made in these countries; today we focus on Indonesia.

Stefanie, a youth facilitator in Indonesia.

“I was a dropout by my second year of junior high school. I didn’t like the school, the other students and the teachers. They said I was naughty, and I was bullied too,” says Chandra, a 16-year-old boy from Semarang, Central Java, Indonesia. “Paulus, the director of KOMPASS, ChildFund’s local partner organization in Semarang, invited me to join the Child Forum and to get back into school. Now I am catching up my education through the informal school and actively involved at the Child Forum. If I hadn’t joined the Child Forum, I would only be a dropout and a motorcycle club hotshot.”

As a member of the Child Forum, Chandra participated in a recent workshop on gender-based violence, part of the Shine a Light project. In an effort to prevent and respond to gender-based violence against children, ChildFund has worked through local partners to educate youth on the issue of violence between intimate partners — a growing problem in Indonesia. The participants in turn serve as peer educators in their communities.

“At the gender-based violence training, we learned about gender and violence, focusing on children and young girls,” says Irma, 18, one of the youth facilitators. “After the training, we held group discussions to get to know what the issues are among us.”

More and more, young people are experiencing violence in dating relationships, not just marriages. These programs are showing Indonesian youth how to manage these relationships in safe and healthy ways, preventing violence before it starts.

The youth facilitators led group discussions with 80 children and youth from several schools. The groups were divided by age: 10-12, 13-17 and 18-24.

Not everyone is comfortable talking these sensitive issues, Chandra explains. “We played some games to lighten the atmosphere, so they could feel more relaxed.”

“I was the facilitator for the 18-to-24 group,” says Irma. “The physical and emotional abuses are also considered as normal for them. They didn’t realize that when they tease or make fun of someone, it could hurt the other person. In the training, I learned that we may also be the person who did the violence toward others without even realizing it.”

Helping children and youth learn about safe and healthy dating practices involves establishing good communication between partners, understanding gender equality and stereotypes, creating boundaries, expressing feelings and perceiving signs of possible dating violence, among other lessons.

Stefanie facilitated the 13-to-17 group. “I found some of them have experienced violence in dating because they were afraid to say no,” she says. “They are afraid of losing their boyfriends. They don’t know to whom to share. They need someone they can trust.”

The physical and emotional abuses are also considered as normal for them. They didn’t realize that when they tease or make fun of someone, it could hurt the other person.

She remembers a girl who was raped and became pregnant, which caused her to drop out of school. “The Community Development Agency of Semarang contacted the Child Forum to ask our opinions on that case. Through the discussion, we found out that students were sharing sexual content on mobile phones at school. We then held a sharing session with the students at the school on violence against children and on reproductive health.”

The facilitators have learned that peer involvement makes students listen more closely than to adults dictating rules.

“When the information is delivered by their own friends, it is more easily accepted and understood,” Irma says. “When it is delivered by older people, the kids tend to be quiet.”

Through the Child Forum, ChildFund also provides leadership training for youth to encourage and support them to be the leaders and role models among their peers. With youth facilitators in the students’ communities, more young people will hopefully feel more comfortable seeking the help they need.

“If I hadn’t joined the Child Forum, I would still be the quiet and shy girl, only focus on academic lessons,” Irma says. “I wouldn’t have any broad ideas about the issues that affect children. Now, since I have joined many activities at the Child Forum, I know more! I was really idolizing Stefanie. I think she is really cool. She knows and shares many things to other children, like the issues of gender-based violence.”

When I grew up near Lake Erie in Ohio, I lived on the north coast; or, taking a Canadian perspective, the south shore. As an adult, I moved to England’s south coast, then the west coast of Africa, and finally, the east and west coasts of North America.

Most of Timor-Leste’s residents are subsistence farmers, growing crops for their families to live on.

Water attracts people. It’s no coincidence that oceans, blood and amniotic fluid all share the same concentration of salt.

Worldwide, three out of five people live in coastal areas, and 50 million call tiny islands home. Although Small Island Developing States (known as SIDS) produce less than 1 percent of global greenhouse gas, their inhabitants suffer most from climate change. Of the 51 countries classified as SIDS, 12 are also among the least developed — including Timor-Leste, where ChildFund works. It gained its independence from Indonesia in 2002.

More than half of Timor-Leste’s population lives in poverty. The United Nations predicts its population will triple to 3 million by 2050, and the country faces a temperature increase of 1.5 degrees Celsius (3.4 degrees Fahrenheit) over that time, according to a 2012 report from the National Center for Biotechnology Information.

We must account for climate change as we address poverty, simply because of its impact on the availability of water and food.

About two in three Timorese people already suffer from food insecurity; half of Timor-Leste’s population is under age 15, and malnutrition affects half of the children under age 5. In Timor-Leste, the hungry season lasts from October through February — until maize, the primary crop, is ready for harvest.

Although 85 percent of Timorese practice subsistence agriculture, the country cannot meet its nutritional needs, partly because insects, fungi and rodents ruin a third of the harvest during storage. Crops suited to the Timorese climate — such as rice, maize, wheat, barley, arrowroot, cassava, sweet potato, potato, cowpeas, red beans, peanuts and coconuts — provide acceptable caloric intake but insufficient protein. For its population to survive, Timor-Leste imports food and exports coffee.

A gift of chickens can help children get the nutrition they need to develop into healthy adults.

So, what happens if Timor-Leste gets hotter and more crowded? Interactions between carbon dioxide (CO2), temperature and water are complex. The so-called “CO2 fertilization effect” benefits certain crops, such as rice, sweet potatoes and peanuts. Others, however, experience harm, especially maize and cassava. Too much carbon dioxide causes cassava leaves, an excellent source of protein, to become toxic.

Warmer temperatures cause crops to mature faster but at reduced yields. Peanut harvests, for example, could shrink by one-fifth. Warmth also favors pests, so incidence of insect damage and fungal diseases will increase. And farming requires rainfall at crucial stages. If Timor-Leste doesn’t receive enough — or gets too much — rain, the crops currently cultivated there may no longer thrive.

Coffee beans are especially vulnerable to heat, and if they don’t adjust to higher temperatures, farmers will move their plants up the central mountain, increasing deforestation and soil erosion.

Climate change also puts Timor-Leste at greater risk of floods, landslides, cyclones and drought — disasters that already affect the country. Grain yields decreased by 30 percent in 2007, due to a drought caused by El Niño, a disruption in the Pacific Ocean related to unusually warm temperatures. Climate models indicate a high likelihood of another El Niño event in 2014.

Climate change is a serious concern around the world, and it often seems like too great a problem for one person. But if each one of us does our part, we can make a difference; you can help improve the diets and incomes of families in Timor-Leste by making a gift of goats, cows or chickens.

You can learn a lot about the children you sponsor through the exchange of letters. For Bernadeta Milewski’s family, their sponsored child Hermie is like a second daughter, despite more than 8,000 miles between them.

After four years of sponsorship, Bernadeta, her husband, Evan, and 6-year-old daughter Nadia traveled in May from Connecticut to see Hermie and her family in San Joaquin, Philippines. It was a dream come true for everyone, Bernadeta says. “When we saw each other for the first time, there were no words, just long hugs. Tight hugs,” she says. “So much affection. In my wildest dreams, I didn’t know it could be so amazing.”

Nadia, Evan and Bernadeta meet Hermie (center).

The Milewskis were there for a couple of reasons — mainly to see 12-year-old Hermie, but also to assist her family, whose home is vulnerable to flooding. Fortunately, San Joaquin did not experience much damage from Super Typhoon Haiyan last November, but Hermie’s home is near water and has suffered harm in other storms. Sponsors typically don’t see their sponsored children’s homes, but the Milewskis were permitted to do so to assess the best way of helping, whether it was renovating the existing home or purchasing property elsewhere.

Ultimately, after thorough discussion with Hermie’s family and local staff, they decided to build a new home; they also purchased a fishing boat for Hermie’s father. Hermie, her mother and siblings depend on his income — often $2 to $4 a day — for their day-to-day needs. The new boat will improve their situation tremendously as it will increase their earnings significantly. “Our plan was to assist Hermie’s family with their living arrangements so that they could have a safe place during typhoons,” says Bernadeta, “but when we learned that Hermie’s father had been working for someone else for over 20 years and therefore making very little money, we quickly decided to help with the purchase of the fishing boat as well.”

The Milewskis sponsor three children through ChildFund; although they have relationships with all of their sponsored children, Hermie was always very special to them, Bernadeta says. Early on, “she was calling us Mommy and Daddy and telling us that she was dreaming of meeting us. We knew we would do everything to make her dream come true. We really love the whole family there. During our two-day visit, there was no awkward moment. We were really kind of reunited.”

Writing letters is very important to the sponsor-child relationship, Bernadeta emphasizes. During the trip, she met other children enrolled in ChildFund-supported programs who hunger for communication and encouragement from their sponsors due to a lack of correspondence. She promised that she would let other sponsors know how much the sponsored children look forward to receiving letters and establishing a relationship with their sponsors.

“They would love to get letters from sponsors,” Bernadeta says. “It’s very important to remind people that it’s not just about the monetary donations. Letters are extremely important. As sponsors, we can tell the children about things they do not know even exist. We can motivate them, encourage them and offer praise. Through letters, they learn about other kinds of opportunities — opportunities their own parents for the most part are not aware of.”

Hermie’s whole family, along with 6-year-old Nadia.

For instance, Hermie’s parents had never been to the main city in their province, Iloilo, until the Milewskis’ visit. “For Hermie, we hope life has more in store, and we want to make sure that she has big dreams,” Bernadeta says. Sponsors don’t take the place of parents, but they often provide a new perspective for children, giving them hope for the future.

“When you become a sponsor, you sign up for some sort of relationship,” Bernadeta says. “If they can feel that someone cares about them, that gives them confidence that they’re really lacking.”

Bernadeta acknowledges that writing to your sponsored child may seem difficult at first and gave some tips to other sponsors:

“I always introduce myself, tell the child who we are and why we sponsor. I am always very positive and ask lots of questions as this opens up a dialogue. I ask what the child likes doing, what holidays he or she celebrates, what their favorite subject is. I always stress how important it is for them to study and encourage them to do their best. We include stickers, postcards, bookmarks, balloons, coloring pages and photos we take during our vacations and on special occasions. As sponsors, we have a very important role in their life. We can provide something different than their immediate families do.”

After the Milewskis’ return home, they received a letter from Hermie. She wrote, “I will give my best to attain my dreams in life to help my family to combat poverty. I will follow you to help the poor so I will not disappoint you, and I will not waste your dreams on me.”

For more tips about writing letters and developing a friendship with your sponsored child, visit ChildFund’s website.

In this blog post, we meet Nuren, a woman who worked for REACH, a project in Indonesia run by ChildFund and UNICEF that promoted health care of pregnant women and young children to help lower the infant mortality rate. REACH ended in December 2013, but the health-care training continues to make a big difference in these communities.

Nuren (left) spends time with a health cadre, his young son and the head of Moesin village (center).

Nuren works in East Nusa Tenggara, training community health volunteers (known as cadres) and families about keeping infants and young children healthy and safe. Beginning in 2011, she traveled to homes and clinics in remote villages, where women traditionally have given birth without access to prenatal care or emergency assistance when it’s needed.

Most health cadres come from non-medical backgrounds, so they received regular support and monitoring during the project’s duration. Nuren’s routine visits helped to remind the volunteers how to provide basic health services, and she checked the amount of medical supplies to make sure health posts were fully stocked. Some visits took hours to accomplish.

“When we had two new cadres in Sotual, we went there for a monitoring visit,” Nuren recalls. “We left the city at dawn to reach Nuapin village. We then walked for three hours through the forest from Nuapin village to finally reach Sotual. The return trip was more difficult, because it was uphill. We took a shortcut, and I almost fell off a cliff on the way back.

“The wife of the health cadre gave us pineapples, but unfortunately, none of us carried a knife. We walked all the way up the hill to our car before we saw an old man with a big dagger to help us cut and eat the pineapples. We weren’t even wondering if the dagger was clean or not, we were just so thirsty from the long walk!”

Upon reaching Nuapin, the group stopped by a health center. “The health worker asked where we came from. He was surprised when we told him that we had just visited our health cadres in Sotual, since they had never gone there before,” Nuren says. “With basic medical supplies in such a remote area and limited access, the health cadres are able to provide basic health care for young children. Seeing this is really rewarding for me.”

In 2011, the REACH project covered 40 villages and 14 health centers. By January 2013, it had expanded to 49 villages and 15 health centers, with more than 200 trained health cadres. Since the project ended, Nuren has continued her work with ChildFund in the eastern program areas.

During a monitoring visit in Fatukoto, Nuren (second from right) visits a young mother who is practicing sei, a local tradition. This room has been better ventilated.

One of the biggest challenges in the project area is the traditional activity called Sei, in which firewood is burned underneath a platform and mattress that a mother and her newborn lie on in a room with very limited ventilation, sometimes as long as a month. It is believed that this practice will make them strong and healthy, but in fact, it contributes to many respiratory problems. Another challenge is that the community’s water source is far away.

Nuren says that although the region continues to face some hardships, “I see the changes happening in the community. People now have a reasonable access to health services. This really helps in obtaining basic health care in critical situations, especially for young children who suffer fevers or stomach aches, as malaria and diarrhea are common in the area.

“I have seen the community is really enthusiastic about the health services they have in their neighborhood. Even though they know the health cadres are trained specifically to help young children, people now choose to go to the health cadres instead of the traditional healer when they are sick,” she adds. “People are also more aware of health issues. They learned not only to be aware of the common symptoms of diseases, but also how to prevent contracting them with healthy living habits.”

Are you a smoker? Maybe you’ve quit, or have you never taken a puff? Perhaps, like many of us, you fall somewhere in between.

I have a lifetime count of less than 100 cigarettes, but I’m not protected: One in ten tobacco-related deaths involves a never-smoker. And of those deaths, one in four is a child — because there is no safe level of second-hand smoke.

Tomorrow, May 31, is World No Tobacco Day, a time to contemplate these grim facts and consider what we can do to make a difference.

Photograph by Tomasz Sienicki – Wikimedia Commons

In my early 20s, working in Saint-Louis, Senegal, I occasionally smoked, even though I hated cigarettes. Smoke filled that sleepy town’s only nightclub, and on Saturday nights, my Gauloises burnt down to my fingertips. Smoking was my cover charge for entertainment.

Several years ago, when I lived in Guinea, I watched children buy single cigarettes at the same shacks where they purchased food: hard-boiled eggs, bread cut to order, powdered milk packets, tea leaves by the gram, hard candy by the piece, tomato paste by the tablespoonful and Maggi stock cubes. Errand boys ran groceries for Mom and cigarettes for Dad, making shopping a gateway activity.

Nearly half of the world’s children regularly breathe second-hand smoke in public places, and two in five have at least one smoking parent. Among Cambodian, Thai, Senegalese, Filipino and Vietnamese, three in five children live in smoking homes, while in Belarus, Indonesia and Timor-Leste, it’s four in five. Southeast Asians suffer disproportionately from second-hand smoke.

By age 15, many boys in developing countries have become smokers, but years can pass before their health deteriorates. Tobacco smoke contains 4,000 chemicals, including 50 carcinogens and another 200 lesser toxins. In Timor-Leste, fully half of all boys between ages 13 and 15 smoke. Among Belarusians, it’s one in three. But boys aren’t the only ones at risk; substantially more Brazilian girls than boys smoke.

Brazil produces the world’s second-most amount of tobacco, which supplants food crops. You can help.

Mothers who smoke often deliver babies prematurely or with lower birth weights, and exposure to second-hand smoke causes one in four sudden infant deaths.

Globally, tobacco consumption is on the rise, and so are its opportunity costs. Tobacco’s direct costs to Thailand could fund the country’s energy services. In Mexico, treatment of tobacco-related illness accounts for one in 10 health care dollars.

According to the World Health Organization, tobacco kills up to half its users. Every six seconds, tobacco takes a life. Every minute of every day, two die in high-income nations, and eight more die in developing countries.

ChildFund works in the world’s second, third and fourth largest tobacco-producing countries: Brazil, India and the United States. Indonesia also ranks in the top ten and, during the past decade, Mozambique, Zambia and Cambodia have experienced the greatest increases in tobacco production. In low-income countries, tobacco contributes to deforestation and supplants food crops. And it’s inefficient; agricultural land yields up to 15 times tobacco’s weight in edibles, which contributes to high rates of malnutrition.

Tobacco plants, like coca and opium, also are biohazards. Children often work in the fields, topping and harvesting green tobacco leaves covered with dew and raindrops. In the heat, that coating of water dissolves nicotine from the leaves. The nicotine solution can cross the skin barrier and pass into the bloodstream, causing acute poisoning. A day’s worth of absorbed nicotine is equivalent to smoking anywhere from 12 to 50 cigarettes.

In the weeks afterSuper Typhoon Haiyandevastated the central Philippines last Nov. 8, Martin Nañawa, a communications staff member in our Philippines office, reported on the children, youth and adults struggling in its aftermath. Six months after the storm, he reports on their recovery. This is his second dispatch; read his first here.

Tacloban sustained some of the most serious damage wrought by Typhoon Haiyan in November 2013.

Taclobanons all knew fear on Nov. 8. That day, Christine, a teacher, survived being trapped in her two-story apartment. For several hours, she was caught with water below and water above. The storm surge flooded her home at street level, forcing her upstairs, where she endured harsh rain and strong winds after her apartment’s roof had been peeled away by the strongest winds she’d ever seen. Christine had to duck and cover in the stairwell, where she could also keep an eye on the churning tumult below.

Her fears would not end there, however. When the storm passed, all sorts of news — true and false — traveled fast among survivors. Some said the mayor was dead; others claimed rebels had descended on the city; still others said inmates were released so they wouldn’t drown in prison.

Power lines were down everywhere, so no one had any way of knowing what was true and what was not. Christine lived alone, and she feared for her safety. She first stayed with her aunt before evacuating to the neighboring island of Cebu, where the city’s urban comforts sharply contrasted with the desperation and scarcity in Tacloban.

Thirteen-year-old Kristine also feared for her life. As the floodwaters of Haiyan’s storm surge poured into her house, she and her mother, her 18-year-old brother and 14-year-old sister climbed over stacked furniture to keep from drowning. Her brother opened a panel in the ceiling, and he helped them all up. In the ceiling, they each lay prone over a wooden beam as roiling rapids filled Kristine’s living room.

After the storm, they surveyed the damage to their home. The walls still stood, but the garage had collapsed, crushing their car.

Kristine

Kristine and her family, like Christine, heard rumors about violence and roving bands of looters. Her father is a police officer, but he was stationed three hours away, and she hadn’t heard anything from him since Leyte Island lost power. Fearing for their safety, the family crawled back into the ceiling so intruders would not find them.

In the pitch-black night, all sorts of unearthly sounds haunted them and fed their fears of danger, both real and imagined.

Loud thuds and creaking at her home’s perimeter gate pulled Kristine out of her thoughts. She held her breath as she listened again, hoping it was just her imagination. There it was again. It sounded like someone was trying to push their gate open. Kristine heard her mother calling to her brother to stay put, but it was too late — he had climbed down from the ceiling to investigate.

He soon reappeared, wearing a grin across his face. Their father was home.

After the typhoon, people on Leyte Island received assistance, but much work was ahead.

Returning to school

After the storm, the Philippines’ Department of Education announced that schools would reopen Dec. 2. Christine returned from Cebu — only to find her apartment had been ransacked. Many things were stolen, and the rest were damaged by the flood. Christine also found that belongings she had stored at Sto. Nino Elementary School had been stolen, along with various other items of school property.

Christine was beside herself. She had become a public school teacher to help people be better and because she loved children, and now she’d been robbed of even belongings she’d never deemed valuable. People seemed to just take things because they could. She couldn’t believe her misfortune.

Nonetheless, she had to come to work. But how would she teach? Teachers and students had lost their books and notebooks, and many children no longer had uniforms and shoes. Everyone still bore the shock of Haiyan, and nobody was in the mood, let alone prepared, to resume school.

Kristine also returned to school Dec. 2, but her heart wasn’t in it. Few of her peers were in attendance. It seemed to be too soon for everyone, especially those coping with far worse circumstances than her family. Kristine’s classmates sat and stared, and they wept for friends they’d lost in the storm.

At the same time, hundreds of evacuees crowded into Sto. Nino School, and both Kristine and Christine found ChildFund staff members among all the new faces. They were organizing a Child-Centered Space there, a place for children to recover from all the intense emotions caused by the typhoon.

Slowly, conditions are improving in Tacloban. Many children have received psychosocial support.

Despite all of her trials and tribulations, Christine signed up as a volunteer. “I’m a teacher. I’ve been a teacher 27 years,” she declared. “I teach because I love children, and help is what they really need right now.” ChildFund staff members trained her and other volunteers to use curriculum developed specifically for emergencies. Instantly, Christine felt she’d made the right decision.

“I conducted CCS sessions at school through December, right until everyone took a break for the holidays. Then in January, we shifted to holding CCS on weekends, to make time for the school curriculum on weekdays,” Christine says. “It gave me so much joy seeing the children’s demeanor improve, hearing them laugh, play and sing again, witnessing children learn to be children again, despite all that’s happened.”

For her part, Kristine was happy that CCS activities filled the gap before regular classes resumed. “We couldn’t really hold class in the weeks after the typhoon,” she says. “But CCS helped us get over the intense memory of fear. When school really resumed in January, we were ready.”

ChildFund also helped Kristine and her classmates get ready to resume school by replacing lost school supplies. “It feels like such a small thing,” Kristine says, “but I was delighted to actually own something new after losing so many things to the storm.” It would be a while before simple things like pens and pencils could be purchased locally in Tacloban.

Christine

Looking back

It’s now been half a year since Haiyan tore through Tacloban and other towns. Christine remains a ChildFund volunteer, and her local knowledge is invaluable to ChildFund’s staff members.

Sometimes she brings Kristine with her to ChildFund activities. During summer break, Kristine is learning outdoors skills through scouting.

Yeyen, a 27-year-old mother of two who lives in Kapuk, West Jakarta, Indonesia, describes the effect an Early Childhood Development (ECD) center supported by ChildFund and Fronterra, a global dairy company based in New Zealand, has had on her family’s life.

“When my first son, Habibie, was only 3 years old, I forced him to read and write. I really wanted him to be ready to go to school. I wanted him to write the letters perfectly, but he wrote them like random drawings. He often cried when I asked him to write properly. It was really difficult. It frustrated me that sometimes I lost my patience and raised my voice, saying that he was a naughty boy.

Habibie at his ECD center in Indonesia.

“It was not that I was being mean to my own child, it was just that I really wanted him to be able to read and write so he could be the smart one in school. I really wasn’t aware that what I was doing to my son is not a good age-appropriate practice. I just didn’t know any better. ’Thankfully, not so long after, when we walked by an ECD center in our neighborhood, we saw children learning and playing together. Seeing that, Habibie told me he wanted to play and learn there too. I was surprised because I didn’t even ask him to! I was so happy that I took him to Mentari ECD center right away.

“In less than a year, my son could sing and pray very well, along with the other children at the Mentari Ceria ECD center. I had taught him how to pray at home before, but somehow he didn’t do that well. It seems the ECD tutors know better approaches for young children. The tutors are so nice and patient, while I used to get easily angry with Habibie. I see how the ECD tutors communicate using a nurturing tone of voice with the children. Soon enough, I also learned for myself how to communicate better with my son.

“It has changed me and surely has changed Habibie! Habibie now also likes to teach his younger sister, Alisa, how to sing and pray,” Yeyen says. Alisa also goes to the center, and she doesn’t receive pressure to learn how to read and write early, as Habibie did.

Tutor Eliana (left) and Habibie’s mother, Yeyen.

“Many parents yell when disciplining their child,” notes Eliana, a tutor at Mentari Ceria. “Yelling is not a form of discipline, but rather a punishment. We have learned so much from the training we had from ChildFund on early childhood development. Discipline is teaching through communication in a calm and gentle way. Children who are yelled at regularly will eventually learn to ignore their parents’ yelling.”

Tutors at the center have been provided with training in early childhood development, which they pass on to parents and caregivers, aiming to create a safe and caring environment with healthy interaction between adult and child.

“I don’t yell at my son anymore or at my daughter,” Yeyen says. “I pay attention to what I say and how I say it to my children. Having fun and interactive activities at the ECD center with other children and the changes in interaction at home have really helped boost my son’s self-esteem. I want my children to play and learn freely.”